Posted 4 years ago on Oct. 23, 2012, 11:44 a.m. EST by WSmith
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Bill Moyers: The Plutocracy Will Go to Extremes to Keep the 1% in Control

Moyers, Matt Taibbi and Chrystia Freeland explain how the plutocrats have willfully confused their self-interest with America’s interest.

October 19, 2012 |

From BillMoyers.com:

The One Percent is not only increasing their share of wealth — they’re using it to spread millions among political candidates who serve their interests. Example: Goldman Sachs, which gave more money than any other major American corporation to Barack Obama in 2008, is switching alliances this year; their employees have given $900,000 both to Mitt Romney’s campaign and to the pro-Romney super PAC Restore Our Future. Why?

Because, says the Wall Street Journal, the Goldman Sachs gang felt betrayed by President Obama’s modest attempts at financial reform. To discuss how the super-rich have willfully confused their self-interest with America’s interest, Bill is joined by Rolling Stone magazine’s Matt Taibbi, who regularly shines his spotlight on scandals involving big business and government, and journalist Chrystia Freeland, author of the new book Plutocrats: The Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else .

Full transcript of the interview below the video:

BILL MOYERS: The new Gilded Age is roaring down on us, an uncaged tiger on a rampage. Walk out to the street in front of our office and turn right and you can see the symbol of it: a fancy new skyscraper going up two blocks away. When finished, this high rise among high rises will tower a thousand feet, the tallest residential building in the city.

The New York Times has dubbed it "the global billionaires club," and for good reason. At least of two of the apartments are under contract for more than $90 million each. Others, more modest, range in price from $45 million to more than 50 million.

Simultaneously, the powers-that-be have just awarded Donald Trump -- yes, that Donald Trump -- the right to run a golf course in the Bronx which taxpayers are spending at least $97 million to build. What “amounts to a public subsidy,” says the indignant city comptroller, "for a luxury golf course." Good grief. A handout to the plutocrat's plutocrat.

This, in a city where economic inequality rivals that of a third-world country. Of America's 25 largest cities, New York is now the most unequal. The median income for the bottom 20% last year was less than $9,000, while the top one percent of New Yorkers has an average annual income of $2.2 million.

Across America, this divide between the superrich and everyone else has become a yawning chasm and studies indicate it may stifle jobs and growth for years to come. At no time in modern history has the top one hundredth of one percent owned more of our wealth or paid so low a tax rate. But in neither of the two presidential debates so far has the vastness of this astounding inequality gap been discussed. Not by Mitt Romney, who is the embodiment of the predatory world of financial capitalism. And not even by Barack Obama, whose party once fought for working men and women against the economic royalists.

So just in time, if not too late, comes this definitive examination of inequality: Plutocrats: The Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else. Its author is Chrystia Freeland, whose journalism is steeped in years of covering robber barons from Russia to Mexico and India. Once deputy editor of The Globe and Mail in Canada and a correspondent for The Financial Times and The Economist, she is now the editor of Thomson Reuters Digital.

We're joined by the perceptive and merciless Matt Taibbi, who has made the magazine Rolling Stone a go-to source for understanding the financial scandals that roil America. Who can forget his 2009 article on "The Great American Bubble Machine," which described investment bank Goldman Sachs as quote, "a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money”? ... Income inequality has soared to the highest level since the Great Depression, with the top one percent taking 93 percent of the income earned in the first year after the recovery, the first full year after the recovery. Why are the two candidates not talking about inequality growing at breakneck speed?

The problem is two-fold, we have newbies that don't get the dirty tricks of politics (or politics at all) and we have Unicorn chasers and both-samers that think a 3rd party will show them the way. Meanwhile, they are clueless and oblivious to the REPUBLICONS behind every single one of their complaints! And that until these Cons are voted out, nothing NOTHING can or will be done to remedy the problems. And there are real RW-GOP plants here to slime real solutions, and encourage anti-Dem blame.

▬►To PROSECUTE Voter Suppression:
18 U.S.C. § 241 : US Code - Section 241: Conspiracy against rights
If two or more persons conspire to injure, oppress, threaten, or
intimidate any person in the free exercise or enjoyment of any
right or privilege secured to him by the Constitution or laws of
the United States, or because of his having so exercised the same;
they shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than
ten years, or both.

▬►Electoral College Reform – convert to popular vote - easily
http://electoral-college.org/
Under the National Popular Vote bill, all of the state’s electoral votes would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states combined. The bill would take effect only when enacted by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes (270 of 538).

There is more than meets the eye here. Did the banks not hear everything we were saying in 08 during the election season?

Did the banks not hear us all screaming that the banks need to be help accountable? Did they think that Obama would get in and not do something about it? Only a fool would think that.

Jp Morgan and Wells just posted record profits for the 3rd quarter. So they are obviously doing just fine, with or without DoddFrank. And the Fed has been feeding them like pigs for a couple years now, without a peep from almost the entire congress. So theres no problem there.

All FrankDodd did was make hundreds of smaller banks go out of business, which were bought up by the big six. And thats what fascism is all about. So no problem there.

So what is it their real angle here? If Obama was making noise about Glass Steagal or prosecuting people I would understand, but thats certainly not the case. So what gives?

Here is his latest oped piece "Lame-duck mischief — The scariest scenario is if a defeated Obama administration were tempted to continue to implement policies it has pursued, especially should there be a narrow or contested victory for Mr. Romney. President Obama has already stretched constitutional executive powers to a breaking point, whether it’s usurping immigration procedures still under consideration in the Congress, letting the Environmental Protection Agency run berserk, or defending the actions of an attorney general under indictment for contempt of Congress.

Spefically: Lame-duck mischief — The scariest scenario is if a defeated Obama administration were tempted to continue to implement policies it has pursued, especially should there be a narrow or contested victory for Mr. Romney. President Obama has already stretched constitutional executive powers to a breaking point, whether it’s usurping immigration procedures still under consideration in the Congress, letting the Environmental Protection Agency run berserk, or defending the actions of an attorney general under indictment for contempt of Congress.

I thanked you very politely for your very important and valuable quote regarding Bernies concern of the risk/threat of Pres Obama mistakes/failures.

Like Bernie I am most concerned about the items listed. like Bernie I am profoundly distressed at Pres Obamas continued compromise with the right wing wackos.

So like Bernie I know that the only way to create change is to grow this movement and protest for the change that benefits the 99%.

And like Bernie I know that Pres Obama or Romney will be our next Pres.

I also share Sanders opinion that Pres Obama has made real progress on the progressive agenda and ending the right wing fear mongering propaganda/war on terror.

I agree with Bernie that we can work with Pres Obama, pull him from the right, & have him serve the 99%. I agree with Bernie that Pres Obama is better than any republican, and the best candidate running that can be elected.

Obama also endorses illegal drone strikes, a monetary policy based on unlimited resources given to Wall Street, and potentially attacking Iran. Funny that Romney straight up agrees on these 3 issues. It's almost like they're in the pockets of the MIC and the Big Banks.

In regards to current use of drones, the president holds more power than any member of the federal government as there is ZERO congressional oversight on the matter. I also give blame to the CIA, but ultimately it is the president authorizing these drones in the end. Why a president would listen to drug smugglers who operate outside of the law is beyond me.

Also I don't do or say things because everyone else is doing it. 99.5% of voters disagreed with me as I was saying BOTH obama and romney were corporate whores yet 99.5% of the public voted for those 2 corporate whores. Congress does share blame though, as they have not used their role to hold anyone accountable. Dennis Kucinich is trying.

Forgive me for thinking Wall Street whores are inexcusable and should not be elected. I don't care which is worse, I don't vote for terrible and terribler.

This current monetary policy which the overwhelming majority of congress and the president support is giving TRILLIONS of dollars to Wall Street.

From drones to monetary policy? I say the people are responsible for this drone policy. If we stay silent they will continue. I know that the US has cut in half the number of drone strikes without any real protests, but until we have large protests against drone strikes they will never end. Monetary policy is bankster controlled. That will change when the people (again) force money out of politics. We can't expect politicians to anything for us. They are bought and paid for.

He voted for the Tarp Bailouts as a Senator under the Bush administration and reappointed Bush's Ben Bernanke after taking the presidency.... among other things like not even remotely talking about monetary policy and the desperate need to reform policies that essentially are "give unlimited resources to Wall Street"

Romney would have been Wall Street corruption in government version 2.0... but don't worry... version 1.5 is still crushing America.

President Lincoln gave Big Railroad everything they wanted, in order to do his good work.

If we United against the undemocratic powers of greed and tyranny (1%) instead of the Crab Mentality and delusional quest for perfection that keeps us diffused and weak, our leaders would not have to patronize the powers that are always United against US (99%)!!!